7/1/17 - SOUNDCHECK SATURDAY

7/1/17
HAPPY PALINDROME DAY!

Used to listen to the legendary Vin Scelsa on Saturday nights with his "Idiot's Delight" radio show in the New York City area.  I miss those days now that he's retired.  There will never be another.

This is in no way meant to be seen as a replacement.  I could never be that good. It's just some music video filler on the weekend so that I can get a bit of a break and still leave the loyal legions in Team Toobworld something to enjoy.

And I thought this year's Palindrome day would be the perfect opportunity to start......

WITH THIS FIRST ONE, SING ALONG!

Well, that's just a few selections.  I'm sure you've got plenty of other things to do on a Saturday than stay glued to the Toob.....

BCnU!

BOOK 'EM! "LULU AND LUCIA"

There has been a book, found only in Toobworld2 (The Land O' Remakes), which has been running through the 'Father Brown' series since the third season.  "Lulu and Lucia", written by Lucia Morell, is a novel of erotic lesbian fiction.  Fun stuff!

"LAIR OF THE LIBERTINES" (Third Season)

Father Brown finds the book among the various other works of fiction which the killer is going to take with her when she makes her escape.  Included in the pile are various editions of German erotica, "Business As Usual", "With Virtue", and the key to figuring out the killer's true identity, "African Safari".

"CRACKPOT OF THE EMPIRE" (Fourth Season)

While keeping an eye on Mrs. McCarthy after she was poisoned, Lady Felicia started reading the novel and was quite aroused by the experience. (See the picture at the top of the page.)

"THE HAND OF LUCIA" (Fifth Season)

This is the episode which brings the book front and center in the investigation as it is key to the solution of the murder.  I won't say more so as not to spoil it, but I really don't know much more than the identity of the victim.  I have yet to see it.

UPDATE: I have seen it now, and I don't think I've ever encountered a murder victim who had it coming more!  I think note will be taken at the Toobits Award at the end of the year.

Whether or not the book shows up in other episodes, I have yet to find out.  (I'm only up to the middle of the fourth season.  I had been watching the series via CPTV, but now I find the first five seasons are available on Netflix so I'm up for some binge-watching!)

But I think "Lulu and Lucia" is a strong candidate for the 2017 Toobits Award for Best Fictional book in Toobworld, even if it is to be found only in an alternate TV dimension.  But who knows?  Maybe one day another TV show might reveal that it can be found in some TV character's collection.....

BCnU!

SPLAININ TO DO: DE-ZONKING "MODERN FAMILY"

This DVR summary popped up for an episode for 'Modern Family' and I found it puzzling.

They've been to Australia, but when has the show ever gone to Spain?

I wouldn't be surprised if one day a Spanish version of the show did pop up on a Spanish TV network, either in the mother country or down South in Latin America.  The format of the sitcom lends itself to foreign remakes, no matter the language.  Already there is a Greek version:

'Moderna oikogeneia'

The Greek version of the award-winning series Modern family. Three modern families face the usual and sometimes strange problems and compose a complex scene full of madness and love.

And from Israel, I found this reference listed in the IMDb for connections to 'Modern Family':

Eretz Nehederet: 

Episode #9.3 (2012)
The name of the show spoofing "Sabri Maranan" is called "Not Modern Family"

So I looked up 'Sabri Maranen' and found this:

The series follows Shay and Shani who go to Friday dinner. Shani's family is a Mizrahi Family, and Shay's family is an Ashkenazi family. There are episodes that they go to Shay's family the Rosens, and there are episodes that they go to Shani's family the Hassons.

I can see that being basically the 'Modern Family' format, giving it just enough of a twist so that it's not an exact copy.

'Modern Family' at its most basic is just generic enough that there could be variations all over the world and none of them would have to be tossed out to another TV dimension.  Unless of course they never bothered to change the names of the characters - that's why I had to relegate the American version of 'Shameless' to the Land O' Remakes.

Best thing about 'Modern Family' is that it is virtually Zonk-proof on its own.  (They do a lot of Zonking themselves in referencing other TV shows.)  

Here are three examples in which 'Modern Family' was referenced in other shows:

Raising Hope: 

Baby Monitor (2011)
Virginia says, "I've seen this on 'Modern Family' and countless other sitcoms."

Entourage: 

Home Sweet Home (2011)
Lloyd tells Ari that 'Modern Family' creator Steven Levitan is looking for a new agent.

Entourage: 

Out with a Bang (2011)

Lloyd: I had my breakfast meeting with Steven Levitan this morning.
Ari: Congrats. You gonna be the new gay on 'Modern Family'?

These are not insurmountable.  The televersion of Levitan created Toobworld's 'Modern Family' as a reality show, like 'Chrisley Knows Best' and just as manipulated.  "Fake Reality".  The characters are always talking to the camera, making sideway glances at the camera, etc.

It would come off as so contrived that Ari might think that new "characters" could be added in.  And Virginia, not the sharpest tool in the shed when it comes to the Chance family (although she is better than her son and husband!) could mistake the reality show about the extended Pritchett family as being a sitcom.  They always are in laughable situations, after all.

BCnu!

"WHAT HAVE YOU, GEORGE?" "LUCY MAUD MONTGOMERY!"

'THE MURDOCH MYSTERIES'

"UNLUCKY IN LOVE"

From the IMDb:

Murdoch investigates the death of an elderly groom; Crabtree meets Lucy Maud Montgomery at a writing class.

From Wikipedia:

Lucy Maud Montgomery OBE (November 30, 1874 – April 24, 1942) was a Canadian author best known for a series of novels beginning in 1908 with Anne of Green Gables. The book was an immediate success. The central character, Anne Shirley, an orphaned girl, made Montgomery famous in her lifetime and gave her an international following.

The first novel was followed by a series of sequels with Anne as the central character. Montgomery went on to publish 20 novels as well as 530 short stories, 500 poems, and 30 essays. Most of the novels were set in Prince Edward Island, and locations within Canada's smallest province became a literary landmark and popular tourist site—namely Green Gables farm, the genesis of Prince Edward Island National Park. She was made an officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1935.

Montgomery's work, diaries and letters have been read and studied by scholars and readers worldwide.

"Despite the story you have just seen there is no evidence to suggest Lucy Maud Montgomery met Constable George Crabtree or that her work was influenced by him. (He's not real)."

Looking at it from outside the perspective of Toobworld, that was Alison Louder playing Lucy Maud Montgomery, the author's televersion.  And she was" just as real as George Crabtree.

Even when celebrities play themselves in fictional settings, they are still televersions and not the real things.  And so Lucy Maud Montgomery has something in common with Ellen DeGeneres, Roseanne Barr, Mandy Moore, Jane Cobden*, and John F. Kennedy, Jr.: their fictional televersions have all had sex with fictional TV characters.

At the end of this episode about "The Artful Detective", Lucy Maud Montgomery sadly tells George that she must return to Prince Edward Island and that they must bring an end to their relationship, only just blossoming.  George ruefully accepts that, but then she adds that she won't be leaving until the morning....

It takes George a few seconds - he can be rather a dimbulb sometimes - but he realizes what she is suggesting and the scene closes on them kissing in his room.  

I think we can infer that she stayed the night.

BCnU!

* Don't know who Jane Cobden is?  Look her up.  I'm not your Googleboy!

TWO FOR TUESDAY - THE TWO MARGARET HENDERSONS, SPLAINED

Here's an interesting Zonk which can be easily splained away....

But first, be warned: there be spoilers ahead!

Recently there was a mid-season replacement show on NBC called 'Trial & Error', a sitcom about a man put on trial down South for allegedly murdering his wife.  

Here is a copy of the local newspaper reporting on the crime, featuring a photo of the deceased poet Margaret Henderson.

Larry Henderson was convicted, but evidence came out after the trial which spared his life.  Margaret's cell phone was found which contained a selfie video which showed the true "murderer" - an owl which flew into her house and smashed into her, causing Margaret to lurch forward through the plate glass window which delivered the fatal wound.

Sorry for the blurry quality, but it really happened so quickly!

As you can see, the poet in the newspaper was not the Margaret of the cell phone.  I don't see how they could have expected us not to notice, considering there were only about six episodes to the whole series!

Toby, you got some splainin to do!

I hate to throw my brother's noble profession (F you and your "fake news", Drumpf!) under the bus, but somebody at that newspaper bleeped up.  They ran the wrong file photo.  Perhaps that was another Margeret Henderson.  Maybe it was a Margaret Anderson (just not the one in Springfield.)  But it certainly wasn't Larry Henderson's wife.

Looks mean, don't she?  One might have understood if Larry had killed his wife if she looked like that at him all the time.....

By the way, Andie McDowell played the second Margaret.

And the owl didn't escape justice.  it can still be found in the taxidermy shop which shared space with the law firm......

BCnU!

SIGN OF THE CROSSOVER - THE "LAW & ORDER" OF "McCLOUD"

From Wikipedia:

'Law & Order' is an American police procedural and legal drama television series, created by Dick Wolf and part of the 'Law & Order' franchise. It originally aired on NBC and, in syndication, on various cable networks. 'Law & Order' premiered on September 13, 1990, and completed its 20th and final season on May 24, 2010. At the time of its cancellation, 'Law & Order' was the longest-running crime drama on American prime-time television. Its record of 20 seasons is a tie with 'Gunsmoke' (1955–75) for the longest-running live-action scripted American prime-time series with ongoing characters. Although it has fewer episodes than 'Gunsmoke', 'Law & Order' ranks as the longest-running hour-long prime-time TV series. 'Gunsmoke', for its first six seasons, was originally a half-hour program.

'Law & Order' spawned several spin-offs:

'Law & Order: Criminal Intent'

'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit'

'Law & Order: Trial By Jury'

'Law & Order: LA'

'Deadline'

"Exiled: A Law & Order Movie"

It also crossed over several times with 'Homicide: Life On The Street', with one of that shows characters joining the cast of the spin-off 'Law & Order: SVU' (Detective John Munch).  There have been several international adaptations, with 'Law & Order: UK' based on the original series and 'Law & Order: SVU' being interpreted by casts in Russia and France.  (None of these three shows can be directly linked to the American franchise, but Munch got a mention in an episode of 'Luther' - one of the many reasons Detective Munch is the King of the Crossovers.)

So according to Wikipedia, 'Law & Order' began in 1990.  And that's true - from the perspective of the Trueniverse.  But the magic of the Toobworld Dynamic is that as soon as a show is broadcast, then its characters, locations, and the things which it has contributed to that alternate reality automatically have histories which can stretch back along the Toobworld timeline, sometimes even to antiquity.

For the fanficcers among Team Toobworld, you wouldn't have to just consider adventures and crossover for after their shows ended; you could fill in the blanks of their lives from before they debuted on the Toob.  Prequels baby!

Think of the possibilities: Detective Lenny Briscoe may have gone to high school with Jean Davis ('Columbo' - "Requiem For A Falling Star"), Frank Barone ('Everybody Loves Raymond'), Elliot Carlin ('The Bob Newhart Show'), and the twin sisters Helen and Judy, better known by the married last names of Rosenthal and Geller ('St. Elsewhere' and 'Friends' respectively).

All of those options were chosen for the actors being born around the same time as Jerry Orbach.......

And as I mentioned, it wouldn't have to be just the characters.  Their invented locations could also be used to link shows together earlier than expected.  For 'Law & Order', that location would be the 27th Precinct.

So the series may have begun in September of 1990, but the Old 2-7 actually dates back farther than 1990.  We saw evidence of its existence 20 years earlier!

'McCLOUD'

"MURDER ARENA"

In order to rush to the rescue during this case, Marshal Sam McCloud commandeered a squad car to race across town.  And as you can see in this picture, it was assigned to the 27th Precinct.

A lot of possibilites in that: Detective Andy Sipowicz of the 15th (as seen in 'NYPD Blue') may have started out as a patrolman working out of the 27th.  After the series 'NYPD' concluded, maybe Lt. Mike Haines was transferred to the 27th to be its new supervising officer.  Paul La Guardia of the 14th Precinct could have been stationed there from even farther back, long before he worked with Detectives 'Cagney & Lacey'.  And speaking of those Lady Blues, maybe Officer Casey Jones did some of her 'Decoy' work while stationed there. It could have been because of some big case solved by Detective Frank McNeil of the 27th which got him the promotion to Captain, stationed at the 11th (with his best detective being Theo 'Kojak'.)

As a detective on the other coast would often say: "Just one more thing....."

O'BSERVATION: That episode title of "Murder Arena" was not in the original list from the series.  It's a two-hour combination of two other episodes ("The Concrete Corral" and "Walk In The Dark".)  I consider it as just another perspective of the events in McCloud's life rather than having to ship it off to another TV dimension.  There was no similarity in the cases, but it does show that just like in real life, TV characters have to juggle the events of their lives; not everything happens in an orderly fashion.

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TOOBWORLD-TOOBWORLD: "THE LATE SHIFT"

CARTOONS FOR A SONNY (AND CHER) SATURDAY

Back in the early 70s, I used to watch mostly CBS shows.  Pretty much didn't have too much of a choice back in those BC days (before cable.)  Channel 3 out of Hartford came in the best for our house.

But options were pretty limited as well, so I'm not saying this as an excuse; I would have watched the Sonny and Cher variety show anyway, I'm sure.

They had some pretty good running sketches - precursors of the SNL Widettes, for one.  But they also had their own version of music videos with songs accompanied by animation.

Three of the following cartoons have stuck with me all these decades later, of songs I loved and still cherish to this day.  The cartoon for the great Jim Croce song "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown".  My thanks to Christopher Nigro for letting me know it was out there.  I guess I missed that night's telecast....

Anyway, here are my choices for this Video Weekend......

ONE TIN SOLDIER

BLACK & WHITE

BAD BAD LEROY BROWN

BIG YELLOW TAXI

DATELINE TOOBWORLD: THE DEATH OF PICASSO AND THE TONIGHT SHOW

'I'M DYING UP HERE'

"MIDNIGHT SPECIAL"

BILL HOBBS:

You know that Picasso just died, right? 

CASSIE FEDER:

Good.

BILL HOBBS:
What do you got against Picasso? 

CASSIE FEDER:

Four of the women he was with two committed suicide, and two he drove insane.

BILL HOBBS:

So you're saying the guy has a type.
Can I continue? So I'm reading Pablo's obit.
You know, the guy's a famous artist.
He's got nothing to prove, except, apparently, how much pussy he got.
Listen to this:
"Picasso, 91, died in a villa in France and leaves behind a wife almost half his age."

CASSIE FEDER:
Okay, you've got my attention.

BILL HOBBS:

"In addition to his wife, he leaves four children - one son born to his first wife, the dancer Olga Khokhlova."

CASSIE FEDER:

Not just a dancer, the dancer. 

BILL HOBBS:

Right? 

"And daughter born to his mistress, Marie-Theresa Walter."

CASSIE FEDER:

Since when have mistresses been put in obits? 

BILL HOBBS:

"And another son and daughter both the children of Francoise Gilot, another mistress," 

- for those of you keeping score at home, -

"who is now the wife of biologist Dr. Jonas Salk." 

Fuck you, Jonas Salk. You cured polio? I fucked your wife. 

CASSIE FEDER:

That's not an obit. That's a press release for his dick.

So that locks in the timeline for this episode as happening on either April 9 or 10, 1973, depending on the date of the newspaper.....

From Wikipedia:

Pablo Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, print-maker, ceramicist, stage designer, poet and playwright who spent most of his adult life in France. Regarded as one of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. Among his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907), and Guernica (1937), a dramatic portrayal of the bombing of Guernica by the German and Italian airforces.

PICASSO of the TRUENIVERSE

Pablo Picasso died on 8 April 1973 in Mougins, France, while he and his wife Jacqueline entertained friends for dinner. He was interred at the Château of Vauvenargues near Aix-en-Provence, a property he had acquired in 1958 and occupied with Jacqueline between 1959 and 1962. Jacqueline Roque prevented his children Claude and Paloma from attending the funeral.

Devastated and lonely after the death of Picasso, Jacqueline Roque killed herself by gunshot in 1986 when she was 59 years old.

PICASSO in SKITLANDIA

To read more about Picasso, click here.

At one point early in the "Midnight Special" episode, Goldie Herschlag mentions that the "papers cleared Clay over a month ago."  The investigation probably took a couple weeks, so it could have been early February of 1973 when Clay performed 

PICASSO of TOOBWORLD

So with the "Midnight Special" episode happening just after the death of Picasso, that means the "Pilot" episode took place almost two months earlier, probably at the beginning of February.

In the Trueniverse, Johnny Carson was on vacation that first week of February with Jerry Lewis serving as the guest host.  

But we've seen that the televersions of celebrities and historical figures can differ greatly from their real life inspirations:

• Dennis Rodman is an alien.
• Charles Dickens destroyed a race of aliens.
• Mark Twain went to outer space.
• Willie Mays is an warlock.

So this suggestion about Johnny Carson is simple and believable in comparison: 

Carson wasn't on vacation that week.

And because he was going to work the desk, then the line-up of guests would have been changed to accommodate him rather than Lewis.

Of course, whether that was actually Johnny Carson who hosted on the night Clay Apruzzo appeared is another story......

BCnU!

GPS-TV: A TOOBWORLD TRAIN TIMETABLE

'HERE'S LUCY'

"LUCY VISITS THE WHITE HOUSE"

From the IMDb:

Lucy and Vivian's sons' Boy Scout club make a replica of the White House out of sugar cubes. The President is so impressed that he invites all of them to the White House to unveil it. Calamity ensues when the replica get destroyed on the train.

The Toobworld version of the United States of America (which I unofficially call "Telemerica") has more towns and cities than the actual USA.  A lot of them are famous; some even got their names in the title, with one eventually getting its name in the titles of two spin-offs. And two of them at least are multiversal.

• Fernwood
• Cicely
• Dunn's River
• Hooterville
• Metropolis
• Gotham
• Twin Peaks

Those are just a sampling.  But there were plenty of shows which passed through small fictional towns for just an episode but that's all which was needed to give them their own push-pin on the map.  And this episode of 'The Lucy Show' was no different.  

As Lucy and Viv made their way to Washington D.C., the train made stops in the following towns:

• Greenview
• Middlebrook
• Flint Ridge
• Scottville

All of those, including Danfield, can only be found in Earth Prime-Time, but not in Earth Prime.  So where in "Telemerica" would they be located?

The destination was Washington DC, so that's locked in place.  As for their starting point, I think they left from Danfield and transferred to the Silver Meteor train in New York City; it's an established, long-standing route.  I believe the others are listed in order of arrival as the train worked down the Mid-Atlantic route.

So let's fill in the blanks.

GREENVIEW - New Jersey!  A perfect name to be found in the Garden State and I would not be surprised to find that it didn't live up to the name.  It would be the TV punchline thing to do.  It has to be the first stop after leaving New York City because Lucy would have jumped off the train the first chance she got in order to get the sugar cubes to rebuild the "replicker" (as JFK pronounced it.)  But the reason I'm hesitant to use it is mainly for the sake of poor Annabelle.  That horse would have had to carry Lucy practically to Washington, finally dislodging her in time to catch the train in Scottville.

MIDDLEBROOK - Pennsylvania.  Probably a toney suburb encroaching on Philadelphia from the North, with gated communities, elite prep schools....  A place where the people walk with their noses in the air.

FLINT RIDGE - Delaware.  More than likely Flint Ridge is otherwise off the beaten path in the nation's second smallest state.  I like to think there is more than one Flint Ridge in "Telemerica," because it's the type of name I'd expect to find just up the road a piece from Walton's Mountain.  There's a signpost up ahead.....

SCOTTVILLE - Maryland.  This one intrigues me for the possibilities in connections to other TV shows.  I was hoping I could make the link to Francis Scott Key of Baltimore, but I would have to take it back further than the composer of "The Star Spangled Banner" (multi-dimensional: 'Voyagers!', 'Animaniacs', 'Drunk History') in order to find out where his parents found the inspiration for his middle name.  

So instead, i'm going with General Charles Scott, head of Intelligence during the American Revolution and later the governor of Maryland.  (Played by Michael Gaston in 'Turn'.)  In Toobworld, it is the last stop before entering the nation's capital.  It is also very close to Virginia and may have been highly influenced by that neighboring state.  Earlier on, that area was under the dominion of the Virginia charter and perhaps those feelings of loyalty lasted even after the demarcation set by the Mason-Dixon line, well into statehood in the new nation.  The people of that town, upon incorporation, named themselves after the patriot and governor of Virginia - Scottville - rather than taking the name of a Maryland native son as their inspiration.  

I've got another theory of relateeveety for Scottville in relation to Governor Scott.  As a landholder in Virginia, Scott had about ten slaves and the custom was to give those slaves the last name of the man who owned them.

So I believe master spy Alexander Scott ('I Spy') was descended from slaves owned by the televersion of Charles Scott.  As he was the head of intelligence for the Continental Army, it could be said that "Scotty" was carrying on the family business.....

There's one last location from this series to tackle - the biggest one, Danfield.

When I was a kid watching this syndicated series in the afternoons, I got it into my head that Danfield was in Connecticut just like I was.  (No surprise there - when I was six years old, I ran away from home because I was convinced Captain Kangaroo's Treasure House was on the next block.)

But Geoffrey Mark, the go-to guru for all things Lucy who penned an excellent book about the queen of TV, inclusive and exhaustive in the compilation of trivia, had this to say in the book:

Several episodes firmly placed Danfield in New York State just north of new Rochelle.  Many books state that the town is located in Connecticut, but this is not so. (There is a Danfield in Connecticut but it is not the Lucy shows town.)

I heard back from Geoff on Monday the 19th in which he gave me some more information... information... information.....

I asked him about specific episodes which would confirm Danfield as being in New York.  (I'm afraid it was the Doubting Thomas in me, which is one reason I prefer "Toby" over my given name!)

Geoff:

The easiest one is "No More Double Dates", where Lucy and Harry want to be alone and Viv and her date keep taking them to the train station to go into NYC. They make it clear that Danfield is the next stop after New Rochelle, NY (they could have visited Rob and Laura Petrie) on the way to NYC.

I guess you can't get more specific than that!  And man, I like the idea that Lucy and Viv might have met the Petries on the train!

This episode about the sugar cube White House has Lucy also telling the White House operator that she was calling from Danfield, New York.  So that's that!  Oh well, I still have Dunn's River and fictional towns from 'The Fugitive' and 'Murder, She Wrote' for my Nutmeg State.....

So I can see them taking the Harlem-Hudson line down to NYC and then switching over to the Northeast Corridor train.  It's amazing the sugar cube White House made it that far!  Have you ever tried to maneuver through that train station even without a sugar cube White House?  (The train probably was the Silver Meteor on the Pennsylvania Railroad line until the Washington station.)

A big thanks to Geoff Mark for his help in putting together this Toobworld train timetable.  If you're interested in learning more Lucy lore, you can't go wrong with his book, seen above.  It's a valuable asset in the stacks at the Toobworld Central library......

BCnU!